It is a matter of common knowledge and experience that the hair growing on an animal, for example, the hairs on a human head, varies with the individual. This variation can be characterized as ranging from coarse hair, ultimately to fine, limp hair. Many cosmetic treatments have been proposed to correct defects in hair and to beautify it according to the prevailing styles; means are known, for example, to straighten tightly curled hair, or to curl straight hair, and to recondition hair which has been damaged by overexposure to the sun, or dyes and bleaches, and the like.
It is well known that coarse hair is more difficult to mold and style, and once styled, to keep in place, than hair of medium texture. The same problem arises with hair which is thick, that is, which is both dense and full. The term "dense" refers to the number of hairs per unit area and the term "full" refers to the common characteristic of body or fullness attributable to a mass of hair. It has been proposed to use creams, oils, alcohols, fats, such as lanolin, and styling gels, as cosmetic aids to mold thick hair. None of these is entirely satisfactory because many of them impart a "greasy" look to the hair and, with others, often an additional spray coating is needed to retain the styling. A need therefore exists to provide cosmetic grooming aids and methods to permit coarse hair and thick hair to be styled and molded more easily, to permit the styled hair to stay in place without the need to use lacquer hair sprays, and to avoid a greasy look.
On the other hand, soft-textured hair of less than medium texture, and thin hair, which is both sparse and lacks body or fullness, also presents problems in styling and keeping it in place. For example, after treatment with gummy greases and oils or alcohols, soft-textured fine hair appears to become thinner and less agreeable to the eye. To illustrate, several hairs may become "glued" into one. This problem is especially acute in so-called baby fine hair in which the thin hairs lay very close to the head. In addition, sparse hair, on men and women who have lost or begun to lose hair, due to age, or for other reasons, must be styled to take full advantage of the natural hair available. Many of the prior grooming aids mentioned above subtract body and therefore are entirely unacceptable. Thus, a need also exists to provide non-gummy means to style thin hair which will enhance the appearance thereof providing body, bulkiness and fullness to the hair.
Hair lacking elasticity also is difficult to style and manage. Hair that has been overprocessed by being chemically penetrated for tinting or bleaching, and the like, over and over again, usually is damaged and will no longer take a set. The hair just hangs. Sets are ineffective because the elasticity has been lost.
Most currently available so-called conditioners are ineffective to elasticize the hair, and this loss of elasticity detracts from the natural "springy" look of healthy hair. Particularly, with the recent emphasis on the "dry look," it is as desirable to retain the "spring" seen in normally elastic hair, as it is difficult to treat it to do so. Therefore, a need exists to provide a grooming aid and method to enhance the naturalness and elasticity of hair, and to bias the hair so treated into a natural set, which has remarkable endurance. The hair grooming aid of this invention is directed to fulfilling this need.
This invention incorporates the special use of a commercially available product commonly known as fibrillatable polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) which is produced and marketed by several chemical companies. Nowhere in the prior art has it been disclosd that fibrillatable PTFE is useful as a hair control agent, especially as taught in the present invention. Non-fibrillatable PTFE has been used as a component in hair-straightening formulations (see Scott Pat. No. 3,568,685) as a lubricity agent. However, this use of the most common forms of granular PTFE molding powder has no relation whatsoever to the hair net effect resulting from the unique use of fibrillatable PTFE in accordance with the present invention.